


Show Me The Data

by Dracothelizard



Category: Arts & Sciences RPF
Genre: Crack, Data - Freeform, Kink Meme, Masturbation, Other, Science, Science nerd
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-07
Updated: 2010-06-07
Packaged: 2018-11-10 09:04:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11124078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dracothelizard/pseuds/Dracothelizard
Summary: For the following prompt, written back in 2010:"Ben Goldacre gets off to well-conducted systematic reviews. I don't know if this is a prompt or just a fact."





	Show Me The Data

**Author's Note:**

> This is obviously not true, as far as we know.

Every now and then, especially after he had just written something dripping with annoyance, or had just delivered a particularly angry rant, people asked him why he spent so much time reading articles that pissed him off to no end. "Can't be good for your blood pressure," some had said. "You'll have a fit at some point. Cause of death: homeopathic fuckwits." That had been Robin, who had been serious beneath the mock-concern.  
  
His usual reply was that it was better to rant or write about the annoying articles than keep it to himself, and besides, somebody had to point out how ridiculous some 'scientific' claims were. Might as well be him, right? And he liked doing it.  
  
"Why not write about good articles more often, then?" Another one of those common questions.  
  
Well, it was simply more fun criticising something rather than praising it, and admittedly, it was also easier to point out clearly what was wrong with an article than to explain what was right.  
  
That, and if he wrote more about the good articles, he wouldn't get nearly as much done. There was just something about a well-written article, especially a good systematic review that just did something to him. Was it the thoroughness? The way the best ones were critical of other articles and research? Whatever it was, it sent his pulse racing.  
  
Which was obviously something he was never going to tell anyone, ever, but it was a bit annoying when he had to get other things done, even though he had just stumbled across an absolute beauty of a systematic review. He hadn't thought it'd be the kind of review he really liked, because it was about nonpharmacological intervention, and while that was certainly useful, the reviews rarely contained the sort of quantifiable results that caused an effect most people got from other things they had found on the internet.  
  
The first sign that he was in trouble was the thoroughness with which they had described their search strategy and criteria of inclusion. He was a sucker for any systematic review that used more than just Pubmed and had strict inclusion criteria.  
  
If there was an embarrassing noise when he saw the heading 'quality of studies', he wasn't admitting to it, and it was followed by their description of the data collection and analysis which just - that was just cruel. Didn't these authors know what they were doing to him, with their meta-analysis and standard mean difference and standard deviation, and he was definitely going to need some tissues or wet wipes for this.  
  
And they had a table for their assessment of the methodological quality of the studies, which, because the review authors were clearly evil, had the data of their statistical analysis underneath, both the numbers and a beautiful graph of pooled results, and he still hadn't quite managed to get his trousers undone.  
  
He wasn't coming in them again. It was embarrassing, even if he didn't need to explain the stains to anyone.  
  
Oh, fuck, _another_ forest plot with another set of data and pooled results and seriously, seriously, the authors had clearly sat down and discussed the evilest way to do this review. They were all evil bastards, giving him the _chi square scores_ on top of it.  
  
And then they spent most of the discussion section criticising some of the studies that had a poor methodological quality. How was he supposed to read that without getting distracted? It was a good thing only one hand was needed to use the mouse, or the whole thing would be even worse.  
  
He felt relief when he got to the end of the article, both because he was finished with the review, and because, well, he was finished.  
  
Although it would definitely require a thorough re-reading. Perhaps even multiple.


End file.
